a blog about sexuality, gender, law and culture

January 31, 2009

Davos not a place to meet girls

Let's hope that the about-to-be new Prime Minister of Iceland, the world's first openly gay head of state, is not looking forward to the World Economic Forum as one of the perks of the job. From The Guardian, which gets cred for noticing:

Why are there so few women at Davos
– and why do the organisers seem so unconcerned? An organisation that
is supposed to draw from all the world's talent overlooks half of it.

Flicking
through the fat white book that lists everyone here, I counted only two
female names in the first 50 – and the first of those is HH Princess Inaara, the Begum Aga Khan. No doubt talented, active in excellent philanthropic work – but hardly typical.

For
the most part, this conference is a sea of middle-aged men in ties.
Many sessions only involve male speakers. This afternoon's debate on
development, chaired by Barbara Stocking of Oxfam, may be a Davos first, with an all-female panel.

The
excuse, of course, is that Davos represents the world as it is. If most
governments and businesses are run by men, then that it is not the
fault of the World Economic Forum. But an organisation whose motto is
"committed to improving the state of the world" should do better than
that.

At a small dinner in an out of the way hotel last
night, it took Africa to make a stand. A discussion of the "unknown
Africa" (think growth and good government, not war) not only had two
women speakers out of four, but one of them was a prime minister, Luisa Dias Diogo, who has run Mozambique since February 2004.

Posted by Nan Hunter at 06:40:00 AM

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